stony ground and the seed takes no root, other is thorny, and the seeds, springing up, are choked, other still is good ground and bears fruit, some thirty, some sixty, some an hundred fold. In other words the state of our own responsiveness determines the effect upon us of the radiancy of the objects with which we come in contact.
The quartz picked up from a ledge may be full of valuable mineral, but to the ignorant it is "a piece of rock and nothing more."
The ordinary traveler on the desert sees a large black beetle. Knowing nothing of beetles, it is to him "only a bug." But the scientific entomologist, seeing the same beetle, is carried away with delight, for he recognizes the rare Dinapate Wrightii, one of the least seen and most rare of American beetles.
Most travelers seeing the cactuses of the desert note but a few varieties, but the trained observer revels in hundreds of differences in mammillaria, opuntias, echinocactuses, and agave.
Some see no beauty in them, some delight in their many and diverse charms; to some their thorns are hideous and repulsive, to others both interesting and beautiful in their arrangement and design.
According to our receptivity do these objects of Nature affect us—some in one way, some another. The more sensitive our minds and souls are to what they perceive, the more we receive, absorb, gain, and, therefore, the more we in turn radiate to others, but we must remember that the character and quality of that which we receive will be reflected, therefore it is necessary to be constantly in that attitude of mind which is receptive to good only.
CHAPTER II
THE RADIANT AURA
Swedenborg, who was one of the most eminent of scientists and engineers, as well as the founder of the religious system that bears his name, asserted that various "aura" surrounded all living beings, and that the mental or spiritual state radiates, just as light and heat radiate from the sun, and cold from the snow. When one was angry, he said, he gave out the aura of anger which enveloped him as a cloud. Hatred had its aura, as well as love, sympathy, purity, impurity, kindliness, charity, jealousy, courage, justice, and the like.
He also asserted that, to those who were simple, natural, and unspoiled by false reasoning—those who were spiritually inclined—these varied aura were clearly perceptible, and were as certainly felt or seen as were heat, cold, whiteness, blackness by the senses.
Rudyard Kipling bases his story, "They," which appeared some years ago in Scribner's Magazine, upon this statement of Swedenborg's, and in this light it becomes an extra fascinating story to read.
A great modern French scientist has made many exhaustive studies of these aura, and claims to have photographed them.
In the Panama-Pacific Exposition, one of the exhibits contained a series of interesting pictures, or diagrams, which purported to be exact representations of the various aura of people under different mental conditions. In an article on this subject, written by a well-known authority, we are told that:
It is not around the human body alone that an aura is to be seen; a similar cloud of light surrounds or emanates from animals, trees, and even minerals, though in all these cases it is less extended and less complex than that of man.
The occultists assert that the aura is extremely complex in its character, in other words, that there are several aura superposed one upon the other. The first appearance is of a luminous cloud, extending some eighteen inches or two feet from the body, assuming a somewhat oval shape. Careful study, however, reveals that this first appearance is resolvable into several component parts, or separate aura, of different degrees of tenuity, and, apparently, superposed. Five of these have been defined. The first, or most material, is that pertaining to the physical body. In a state of health this is composed of separate, orderly, and nearly parallel lines, which radiate from the body in every direction.
When one suffers from disease the lines in the neighborhood of the part affected become erratic, and radiate less actively but in the wildest confusion, or, if the whole body be affected, all the lines are consequently erratic.
For a long time it was not known what kept these lines straight and approximately parallel in the case of the healthy person, until a second radiating aura was discovered. This comes from a healthy body in pulsating waves, with such vigor as to compel the rigidity of the health lines. These waves may be compared to the pulsations of the heated air which rise from the ground on a very hot day. Baron Reichenbach made experiments with certain sensitives who declared they could see these radiations, and he called them "the magnetic flame."
When these "waves" come from a sickly or weakly body they not only lose power, but seem to give a confused direction to the health lines.
Many observations also have led to the conclusion that when the lines are kept straight by the force of the pulsating waves from a healthy and vigorous body, "it seems to be almost entirely protected from the attack of evil physical influences, such as germs of disease—such germs being repelled and carried away by the outrush of the life-force: but when from any cause—through weakness, through wound or injury, through over-fatigue, through extreme depression of spirits, or through the excesses of an irregular life—an unusually large amount of vitality is required to repair damage or waste, within the body, and there is consequently a serious diminution in the quantity radiated, this system of defense becomes dangerously weak, and it is comparatively easy for the deadly germs to effect an entrance."
The third aura is that which expresses one's desires—a kind of mirror in which every feeling, every desire, every thought almost, of the personality is reflected. This changes constantly, in some people, accordingly as they are swayed by their impulses. Its colors, brilliancy, rate of pulsations, alter from moment to moment, or minute to minute. "An outburst of anger will charge the whole aura with deep-red flashes on a black ground; a sudden fright in a moment will change everything to a mass of ghastly livid gray."
Connected with this, and yet, seemingly, of a separate character, are the radiations of the aura that express the progress of the personality into higher and better appreciation of the things of mind and spirit. The more intellectual and spiritual one becomes the more steady and beautiful are the colors and radiations of this aura, and the variations and distressing manifestations of the evil desires of the third aura become less apparent and distinct.
The fifth aura is the highest at present discernible. It manifests the spiritual development of the individual and is of almost inconceivable delicacy and beauty. It seems to be a cloud of living light—the word cloud being used for want of a better term.
In the concrete examples of aura that were presented at the Exposition, that which radiated from a wise mother showing her protective love for her infant, was in the form of outspread wings of a beautiful rosy tint, the wings held together at the articulations by a sheaf-like mass of golden yellow.
Selfish ambition, sudden fear, explosive anger, selfishness, grasping animal affection, greed, jealousy, jealousy mixed with anger, gloom, murderous hatred, were all displayed in peculiar, hideous, and repulsive forms and colors.
Pure, radiating affection, on the other hand, was represented in the form and color of a round body exhaling rays as from a rosy sun. Strange to say, though I had never read anything explicit upon this subject before, I had always conceived of pure affection as giving forth radiations of this exact appearance.
Whether this "occult" explanation of the radiation of aura be a true one or not, it serves to give one a beautiful conception, viz., that every soul may strive so to live within that he sheds upon his fellows glorious rays of light, serenity, warmth, comfort, blessing, joy, happiness that help them to the attainment of like felicities.
In the earlier part of this chapter Swedenborg's assertion will be recalled that those who were unspoiled, real children of Nature, could actually perceive these aura, and that their acts were guided or influenced by them just as ours are by the perceptions of our five senses.
When